ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) \u2014 A former senior NASA employee who cheated the government out of nearly $275,000 in pandemic-related financial assistance has been sentenced to 18 months in prison. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The sentence imposed Thursday on Andrew Tezna, 36, of Leesburg, Virginia, was roughly in line with the 21-month sentence sought by federal prosecutors in Alexandria. Tezna\u2019s lawyer had asked for a sentence of home detention. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Tezna pleaded guilty to fraud after submitting bogus applications under the government\u2019s Paycheck Protection Program. He concocted businesses in his own name and that of his mother-in-law, and grossly inflated the scope of a side business owned by his wife.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He also falsely filed for unemployment benefits on behalf of his mother-in-law, who was retired. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
During the fraud, Tezna was making more than $180,000 annually working in NASA\u2019s financial offices. He used the money to pay off a swimming pool, credit cards, and a Disney timeshare. He also paid more than $6,000 to a dog breeder for a French bulldog.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In all, Tezna admitted to applying for more than $350,000 in benefits and receiving more than $270,000.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Tezna\u2019s lawyer said in court papers that Tezna lost his NASA job and is now earning $14 a hour at a home-improvement store. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
During the fraud, Andrew Tezna was making more than $180,000 annually working in NASA’s financial offices.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":26897,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":9,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[106,31,33,9],"tags":[],"coauthors":[2723],"class_list":["post-15628","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-daily-brief","category-home","category-newsletters","category-federal-oversight"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"JZKXJ5KSNFC2DLBLDXKH2FVUD4","arc_canonical_url":"\/federal-oversight\/2021\/07\/16\/ex-senior-nasa-employee-gets-18-months-for-pandemic-fraud\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n